The Third Portable Wargame Compendium: An update

Work has been continuing on the next Portable Wargame Compendium. I am awaiting two more articles (another about the Napoleonic Wars and one about re-fighting the Battle of Gettysburg), and once those have arrived, been added to the existing draft, and proofread, I will be beginning the publication process.

The Third Compendium currently includes the following articles:

• Modifications to the Ancients rules in Developing the Portable Wargame for fighting medieval battles
• Constantinople Beleaguered ... a PW3x3RW campaign idea
• A simple English Civil War campaign system for Portable Pike and Shot
• Simple English Civil War 8 x 8 Campaign Rules
• Some suggested improvements to the Brigade-level Portable Napoleonic Wargame Rules
• Ideas for developing the Portable Napoleonic Big Battle or FP3x3PW Rules
• Wargaming the Flagstaff War – New Zealand 1845 – 1846
• Sham-Battle and the Portable Wargame: Melding two concepts to produce a set of mini-campaign rules
• Some well-known scenarios revisited
• Big Battles, Small Armies
• A simple framework for narrative campaigns
• 6 x 6 Portable Wargames

This looks as if it is going to be the biggest compendium to date ... and I hope to publish it by the end of August.

The Guns of Toblerone

On Tuesday afternoon I watched THE GUNS OF NAVARONE on the Film 4 channel ... and it reminded me that ten years ago I took part in one of the most memorable wargames I have ever participated in.

Ian Drury's THE GUNS OF TOBLERONE was a role-playing game ... and the players threw themselves into the game with great gusto. The result was more Hollywood than reality ... but it was tremendous fun!

My role was a member of a special SOE (Special Operations Executive) team that was tasked with destroying a pair of heavy guns on the German-occupied island of Toblerone. The following photographs give a flavour of the game.

Ian Drury sets out the terrain.

The intrepid SOE team prepare to 'take off' in their 'borrowed' JU-52 ... humming the tune from 'Where Eagles Dare'! Trebian (near right) seems half asleep, Martin Rapier (near left) looks apprehensive, He was right to be as he the only Greek-speaker in the team ... but he was an academic who only spoke and read Ancient Greek! Tim Gow (in the green shirt) laughs in the face of danger ... and I am sat behind Tim with my arms crossed!

Gavascone, the main town and seaport of Toblerone.

The main objective: the Guns of Toblerone.

Another part of the objective: the Eagles Nest, headquarters of the German garrison on Toblerone.

The olive groves ... where dirty deeds might (or might not) have taken place!

The centre of Aghias Nikolaos, one of the main towns on Toblerone. Stavros' Bar was the rendezvous point for the SOE team to meet the leader of the local resistance group.

The bridge, over which the survivors made their escape. I seem to remember that a motorcycle was crashed during the process ... but I may be wrong.

The airfield ... where a JU-52 might just be waiting to land in order to pick up any survivors.

Trebian making a point to Martin Rapier ... but I cannot remember what it was.

As to our success ... well, my memory is that we achieved our objective, but that the cost was high.

United States Independence Day

May I wish all of my regular US-based blog readers a happy and safe Independence Day holiday.

For once I will use an expression that I really don't like when I hear it, but which on this occasion is absolutely bang on the nail:

HAVE A NICE DAY!

The Attack on Morobad: Some scenario specific rules

In my previous blog post, I forgot to include the scenario specific rules for THE ATTACK ON MOROBAD. These are:

• Units attempting to climb unbreached walls must stop at the bottom of the wall and may not attempt to climb the wall until the next turn.
• Units climbing through breached walls treat them as entrenchments.
• Artillery can fire at a grid area containing a section of wall and tower/gate rather than at an enemy unit occupying that grid area.
• If a section of wall or a tower/gate receives three direct hits from artillery fire, it is deemed to have been breached, and any unit on that section at the time it is breached is deemed to have been hit.
• If two sections of wall are breached, the Hauserians must take a morale test. If they fail, the Sultan will surrender.
• To test their morale, the Hauserians throw a D6 die for each of their units (not including the commander) and total the dice scores. If the totaled score is greater than the army’s remaining SPs, the Hauserians fail the morale test.
• The morale test is repeated every time a further section of wall is breached.
• If an enemy unit manages to enter the city of Morobad, the Hauserians must take a morale test. If they fail, the Sultan will surrender.
• If the Sultan is killed, the Hauserians will surrender.

The Attack on Morobad: A Portable Colonial Wargame video

I have finally finished the video that I was working on towards the end of June and I uploaded it to the Wargaming Miscellany YouTube channel earlier today. The video is entitled THE ATTACK ON MOROBAD: A PORTABLE COLONIAL WARGAME.

It lasts just under 36 minutes and includes a reasonably detailed blow-by-blow retelling of a Colonial wargame fought using the simple rules from THE PORTABLE COLONIAL WARGAME (i.e. 'The Gatling's jammed ...'), and I hope that it help people to understand how the main PORTABLE WARGAME mechanisms used in the rules work.

The video can be found here on the Wargaming Miscellany YouTube channel.

The Armies of Europe Illustrated

On Saturday I received the very welcome gift of a facsimile book from Mark Cordone. The book is entitled THE ARMIES OF EUROPE ILLUSTRATED and was translated by Count Gleichen* from the original German book by Fedor von Köppen. The book was illustrated by Richard Knötel and contains a mixture of both coloured and black & white images.

Besides a Contents page, a Preface, and a Translator's Preface, the book is split into twelve chapters and an appendix.

• Army of the British Empire
• The German Army
• Austro-Hungary
• Italy
• France
• Russia
• Denmark
• Sweden and Norway
• Spain and Portugal
• Switzerland
• Holland and Belgium
• Turkey and the States of the Balkan Peninsular
• Appendix (Navies)

Each of the above chapters gives a fairly detailed snapshot of the army or armies it covers, including the organisation of units and formations, the length of training undertaken by officers and men, the numbers serving with the Colours and available for wartime service, the terms of service (e.g. universal conscription, voluntary service) etc.

This is a very useful book for anyone interested in the armies of the Belle Époque ... and the illustrations will provide plenty of inspiration for those of us who like to have colourful armies on our tabletops.

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* Count Gleichen was in fact Major-General Lord Albert Edward Wilfred Gleichen KCVO CB CMG DSO (15th January 1863 to 14th December 1937). He joined the Grenadier Guards in 1881 and eventually became a Major General. He served with the Guards Camel Corps in the Sudan campaign during 1884 to 1885 and with the Egyptian army during the Dongala campaign in 1896. He served as a military attaché in Berlin (1903 to 1906) and then Washington (1906 to 1907). He commanded the 15th Brigade from 1911 to 1915 and 37th Division during 1915 and 1916. He then became an Intelligence Bureau director at the Department of Information from 1917 to 1918 and then served as Chairman of the Permanent Committee on Geographical Names from 1919 onwards.

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THE ARMIES OF EUROPE ILLUSTRATED was originally translated by Count Gleichen. This facsimile edition was published by The Naval & Military Press Ltd (ISBN 978 1 78331 175 0).